Top 10 Ways to Be a Successful Entrepreneur

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Entrepreneurship is about being the last man standing. It's about having the determination, the...

Entrepreneurship is about being the last man standing. It's about having the determination, the discipline, and the cash to see it through. Most successful #entrepreneurs follow comparable patterns and share similar basic characteristics.While the behavior of every successful entrepreneur is unique, how they think is not.Being a successful entrepreneur means more than starting new ventures
every other day. It means the right attitude towards a business and the
determination and grit to achieve success.

Would you consider yourself a success? An insightful look at what it really takes to be a successful business owner.

I've been an entrepreneur most of my adult life. Recently, on
a long business flight, I began thinking about what it takes to become
successful as an entrepreneur—and how I would even define the meaning
“success” itself. The two ideas became more intertwined in my thinking:
success as an entrepreneur, entrepreneurial success.

I've
given a lot of talks over the years on the subject of entrepreneurship.
The first thing I find I have to do is to dispel the persistent myth
that entrepreneurial success is all about innovative thinking and breakthrough ideas. I've found that entrepreneurial success usually comes through great execution.Also read: 10 Simple Tips To Achieve Goals & Be Success

But what else does it take to succeed as an entrepreneur—and how
should an entrepreneur define success? Here's my top 10 list, in
descending order, for success:

How to Be a Success

10. You must be passionate about what you're trying to achieve.

This means you’re willing to sacrifice a large part of your waking
hours to the idea you’ve come up with. Passion will ignite the same
intensity in the others who join you as you build a team to succeed in
this endeavor. And with passion, both your team and your customers are
more likely to truly believe in what you are trying to do.

9. Focus intensely on your opportunity.

This focus and intensity helps to eliminate wasted effort and
distractions. Most companies die from indigestion rather than
starvation—in other words, companies suffer from doing too many things
at the same time rather than doing too few things very well. Stay
focused on the mission.Also read: 10 Golden Rules For Business Success from Billionaires

8. Success only comes from hard work.

We all know that there is no such thing as overnight success. Behind
every overnight success lies years of hard work and sweat. People with
luck will tell you there’s no easy way to achieve success—and that luck
comes to those who work hard. Successful entrepreneurs always give 100
percent of their efforts to everything they do. If you know you are
giving your best effort, you’ll never have any reason for regrets. Keep
your focus on things you can control.

7. The road to success is going to be long, so remember to enjoy the journey.

Everyone will teach you to focus on goals, but successful people focus on the journey and
celebrate the milestones along the way. Is it worth spending a large
part of your life trying to reach the destination if you didn’t enjoy
the journey along the way? Won’t the team you attract to join your
mission also enjoy the journey more as well? Wouldn’t it be better for
all of you to have the time of your life during the journey, even if the destination is never reached?Also read: 10 Lessons From Successful People: Learn From Failures

6. Trust your gut instinct more than any spreadsheet.

There are too many variables in the real world that you simply can’t
put into a spreadsheet. Spreadsheets spit out results from your inexact
assumptions and give you a false sense of security. In most cases, your
heart and gut are still your best guide. We’ve all had experiences in
business where our heart told us something was wrong while our brain was
still trying to use logic to figure it all out. Sometimes a faint voice
based on instinct resonates far more strongly than overpowering logic.

5. Be flexible but persistent.

Every entrepreneur has to be agile in order to perform. You have to
continually learn and adapt as new information becomes available. At the
same time you have to remain persistent to the cause and mission of
your enterprise. That’s where that faint voice becomes so important,
especially when it is giving you early warning signals that things are
going off-track. Successful entrepreneurs find the balance between
listening to that voice and staying persistent in driving for
success—because sometimes success is waiting right across from the
transitional bump that’s disguised as failure.Also read: 10 Habits to Improve Your Morning Energy & Productivity

4. Rely on your team.

It’s a simple fact: No individual can be good at everything. Everyone
needs people around them who have complementary skill sets.
Entrepreneurs are an optimistic bunch of people and it’s very hard for
them to believe that they are not good at certain things. It takes a lot
of soul searching to find your own core skills and strengths. After
that, find the smartest people you can who complement your
strengths. It’s easy to get attracted to people who are like you; the
trick is to find people who are not like you but who are good at what
they do—and what you can’t do.Also read:12 Productivity Truths All Entrepreneurs Should Embrace

3. Execution, execution, execution.

Unless you are the smartest person on earth, it’s likely that many
others have thought about doing the same thing you’re trying to do.
Success doesn’t necessarily come from breakthrough innovation but from
flawless execution. A great strategy alone won’t win a game or a battle;
the win comes from basic blocking and tackling. All of us have seen
entrepreneurs who waste too much time writing business plans and
preparing PowerPoints. I believe that a business plan is too long if
it’s more than one page. Besides, things never turn out the way you
envisioned them. No matter how much time you spend perfecting the plan,
you still have to adapt according to the ground realities. You’re going
to learn a lot more useful information from taking action rather than
hypothesizing. Remember—stay flexible and adapt as new information
becomes available.Also read: 10 Most Common Small Business Marketing Mistakes to Avoid

2. Be honest and show integrity.

I
can’t imagine anyone ever achieving long-term success without having
honesty and integrity. These two qualities need to be at the core of
everything we do. Everybody has a conscience—but too many people stop
listening to it. There is always that faint voice that warns you when
you are not being completely honest or even slightly off track from the
path of integrity. Be sure to listen to that voice.Also read: 4 Signs Your Business Is In Need For a Transformation

1. Appreciate your success by giving back.

Don't
ever forget this part, arguably the most important part, of defining
yourself as a true success. By the time you achieve your success, lots
of people will have helped you along the way. You’ll learn, as I have,
that you rarely get a chance to help the people who helped you because
in most cases, you don’t even know who they were. The only way to pay
back the debts we owe is to help people we can help—and hope they will
go on to help more people. When we are successful, we draw so much from
the community and society that we live in, we should think in terms of
how we can help others in return. It’s our responsibility to do “good”
with the resources we have available. Also read: How to Make Your Business Sound Unique (Even If it's Not)

How to Measure Success?

Hopefully,
you have internalized the 10 lessons of becoming a successful
entrepreneur. The next question you are likely to ask yourself is: How
do we measure success? Success, of course, is very personal; there is no
universal way of measuring success. What do successful people like Bill
Gates and Mother Teresa have in common? On the surface, it’s hard to
find anything they share—and yet both are successful. I personally
believe the real metric of success isn’t the size of your bank account.
It’s the number of lives where you might be able to make a positive
difference. This is the measure of success we need to apply while we are
on our journey to success.

Editors Note:A successful entrepreneur always has a strong sense of self confidence
and a healthy opinion of their skills and abilities. Their personality
is assertive and strong. They are always focused and do not really dilly
dally with the issues at hand. This is what makes them different from
the rest.

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